A passion for pastry
Gaetano Arria, owner of Gaetano’s Bakery, is definitely in the know when it comes to dough. After working for 31 years as the executive pastry chef at Mike’s Pastry, the famous North End bakery, Arria opened his own in Medway. “I always wanted to do that,” he says. “I have a passion for baking.” After six years in Medway, Arria decided to shift loc...
The Alfa Romeo museum: the history of a legendary Italian brand
The Alfa Romeo Museum – just a few kilometers from Milan’s city center, in Arese – is located inside a 5,000-square-meter, six-story building: one of Alfa’s production plants until 2002, now converted to tell the wonderful story of the legendary car manufacturer founded in Milan in 1910. The visit’s highlights are, of course, the iconic models on d...
The National Italian American Foundation Awards Education Grant
NIAF Chairman Emeritus Joseph V. Del Raso and the Foundation’s Board of Directors are pleased to announce the 2017-2019 Instructor in Residence Award to Elissa Ruffino. For more than 23 years, Ruffino served NIAF as its public relations and communications director and chief brand officer. She is presently teaching at area universities. “We are ve...
Carol Togneri: exposing new “gems” from the Norton Simon Museum’s vault
Carol Togneri’s pivotal moment of discovery occurred in Alhambra, CA, when she was a child and her Tuscan grandma showed her the reproductions of the art treasures, stored in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. No expensive travels, or “Grand Tours” to Italy, but simply the images imprinted on a little book, favored Carol’s intimate revelation. Carol...
Italian restaurant coming to Old Town Warrenton
A new restaurant will open in downtown Warrenton next month. Denim and Pearls, featuring Italian and American food, whiskey and wine, will replace The New Bridge at 29 Main St. “The food will still be upscale, but the atmosphere will be more relaxed,” co-owner Thomas “T.C.” Robinson said in an interview Thursday. Mr. Robinson and Rick Marrero, bot...
The Colossus of Watts Sam Rodia – Designer and Builder of the Watts Towers
“Art is a human activity consisting in this, that one man consciously, by means of certain external signs, hands on to others feelings he has lived through, and that other people are infected by these feelings, and also experience them.” – Lyof N. Tolstoy: What is Art?, 1898 When I was a teenager my father would take us every summer down south to p...
Aqua Pazza Opens in the North End Next Week
Even more Italian food arrives in Boston’s North End next week, courtesy of a redesigned and reconcepted member of a neighborhood restaurant group. Aqua Pazza opens at 135 Richmond St. on Thursday, May 4 in the former Sfizi space, bringing traditional Italian seafood dishes to the area and joining the family of DePasquale Ventures restaurants. Exec...
Immigrant Joseph Rollo devotes his career to helping others on their journey
Love brought Joseph Rollo to America. He was a teenager from Sicily when he first visited the United States and met Anna Maria, the woman he would later marry. The couple sent letters back and forth across the Atlantic for about a year, and though he had never planned to live in America, she convinced him to attend college in the Philadelphia area....
L'italiano alla Disney, cinque cartoon in cinque anni e tre Oscar
A dispetto del nome, di origine russa, e del cognome, di origine ungherese, Mitja Rabar è l'unico animatore italiano ai Walt Disney Animation Studios. "Nell'intera azienda ci sono un po' di italiani, nel settore dell'illuminazione c'è un altro ragazzo ma come animatore è vero sono l'unico" ci racconta da Los Angeles. Negli ultimi anni ha lavorato a...
Students Connect Italian, Marketing, and International Business
Connecting language study to the “real world” is one of the objectives of Dr. Enza Antenos' Business Italian course (ITAL321). There is a significant presence of Italian companies in New Jersey, and it only made sense to bring experts to class to speak to Italian and international business students about Made in Italy and its importance and impact...
Primo Italia in Torrance serves up authentic Italian cuisine
Simplicity is the key to a great Italian dish, according to Primo Italia owner Lou Giovannetti. “Utilize the simple basic ingredients of what is the heritage of Italian cooking and then simply marrying that with historical idea of what Italian food is,” Giovannetti said. Giovannetti owned Lou's on the Hill in Torrance before that eatery shut its do...
Society of Italian American Businessmen Donates $25,000 to SARC
On Friday, April 21, 2017, the Society of Italian American Businessmen (SIAB), a local non-profit civic group, presented the Sexual Assault/Spouse Abuse Resource Center in Bel Air (SARC) with a check donation of $25,000. The check presentation took place at the Richlin Catering & Events Center during SIAB’s sold out 4th Annual Spring Gala, one of i...